#I generally split about 60/40 on the BROTHERS vs. romance track because their brotherhood dynamic is ALSO EXCELLENT

[sabomasochism]

Every time I see a post calling Ace/Sabo problematic I want to scream.

(Any time I see a post calling ANY ship problematic I want to scream but it was an Ace/Sabo thing that broke the camel’s back today so that’s what you get.)

Two points;

One: no ship is problematic. These are FICTIONAL CHARACTERS in a FICTIONAL RELATIONSHIP. If you don’t like it or don’t want to read about it, don’t. Just because you don’t like something does not make it inherently morally questionable or ‘problematic.’

Every time you make a statement about what ships are ‘problematic’ you encourage censorship, impose your own weird puritanical panic on other people, alienate members or your own fandom community— and personally piss me off: a grave offense.

Two: I AM BEGGING Y’ALL TO STOP CONFLATING SWORN BROTHERHOOD WITH INCEST. Folks. Please. Or you better at least be consistent about it and ALSO refuse to ship Ace/Marco, Izou/Thatch, or any of the Whitebeards together, because, news flash, that is also sworn brotherhood.

(Which again, for the people not listening, does not make those ships ‘problematic’ it just makes them things you personally don’t like, which is a very different thing.)

If you don’t then your problem is, what, that Ace and Sabo knew each other as kids when they swore that brotherhood? Cool, do you also demonize all childhood sweetheart stories? Just full-stop think kids are incapable of emotional intelligence and agency? Think relationships and emotions are static and set in stone once established and never change over a lifetime and circumstances?

I lied there are three points; y’all are MISSING OUT by shoving all these excellent potential relationship dynamics into a box you refuse to look at (the drama! The pining! The feelings going romantic on one end and remaining brotherly on the other! The MUTUAL pining! The soul-rending grief of memory reclaimed too late and never getting answers for what might have been! The happy fluffy AUs where everything is fine! The first confusing rush of love with someone who knows you almost better than you know yourself! Graveside confessions of first crushes to someone who you lost and can never get back!) and I for one am kinda sad for you.

tl;dr: Just because you don’t like something does not a) make you correct or b) make that thing inherently wrong on any moral or social level. It’s all fictional my dudes. (Though ‘just because I don’t like something doesn’t make it inherently evil’ is a thing you could probably stand to take out in the real world too, just saying.)

If you don’t like it, don’t engage with it, but stop trying to guilt, judge, or publicly exclude other people for doing so.